One goal down!

I know that many of you who read this are on Facebook and saw my post a few days ago about Matthew and I moving to Omaha.  We were hoping it would happen quickly, and we found out last week that he had gotten a job offer from Gallup.  We are ECSTATIC to be moving.  We'll definitely miss many things about Peoria, but the opportunities that Omaha provides are far bigger and better than just about anything Peoria can offer.  Matt starts his new job on the 6th of February and I will hopefully be moving there soon after.  I'm not 100% sure when because the transfer with my job is going to be a bit more complicated than we had hoped.  Regardless, it's great to know that I will be in Omaha soon!

Now I just have two goals to accomplish in the next year.  Both the German and the weight loss are coming, but I think slower than I would like on both counts.  I need to be better about working out for sure.  I'm losing weight because I've limited calories, but if I do my workout every day, I get quicker results and that's what I'd like.  At this point, I can actually see a difference between myself now and myself two months ago, but I still have a ways to go.  I just have to keep chugging along. :)

I'm also miles ahead of where I was two months ago on the German front, but I'm still a long way from where I'd like to be.  I have days where everything is easy and it all makes sense and I'm very excited, and then I have days where I go to read something in German and my brain is about to explode from all of the material I don't know or understand.  Ultimately, I just need to keep expanding my vocabulary.  I've got a decent handle on the grammar (I know and understand how to use all four cases) and I am definitely capable of basic conversation - I just need more people to speak with.  (Any takers?)

So it's a brief update of how everything is going - I know it's been awhile.  I'm on vacation for the next five days, so I'm planning a multi-part entry (although if I get bored, I'll probably write it all in one go) about nutrition.  Get excited! :)

Till then...

Tschüss!

Happy people just don't shoot their husbands.

I LOVE LOVE LOVE Legally Blonde (I can quote the entire movie from beginning to end) and the quote referenced in the title has always been one of my favorites.  The whole quote is, "Exercise gives you endorphins.  Endorphins make you happy.  And happy people just don't shoot their husbands.  They just don't."

Now, before I started working out I didn't feel like I wanted to shoot Matt all the time (or ever, really), but it's amazing how exercise can take you from a bad mood or a so-so mood and just make you feel better.  I just finished my workout for today and no part of my body is happy; in fact, I'm pretty sure that my leg muscles are getting ready to go on strike against me.  In spite of this, I feel happy - really, really happy - for no apparent reason.  It's easy, when you don't work out for a day or two, to lose motivation and feel like it's a chore but as soon as  you work out again, you just want to keep going because it makes you feel so good.

Lately I've been ridiculously motivated because I fit into a pair of pants that I haven't fit into for about two years. (I was just keeping them around because I hoped to fit into them again.)  I still have a long way to go, but it's amazing how much more motivated I became after that.  And then I take that motivation, work out, and I just feel absolutely incredible.  I feel like I'm becoming a happier person in general.  For the most part all the little stressors that would normally give me a minor panic attack are just irrelevant now.

Hopefully this will keep up and I'll just keep chugging along and do better and longer workouts until I've achieved all my goals in the weight-loss arena!

Tschüss!

German-learning Resources

I haven't talked about much related to German lately, but I came across an excellent website a few days ago so I decided to talk a bit about the resources I have and use.  I'm sure that I've mentioned most of my resources at some point, but I want to go over them for anyone who's trying to learn a language.  I'm pretty sure that almost everything I use is available for other languages as well, so it's relevant.

The biggest resource that I use right now is Rosetta Stone

Spiffy picture, no?

Everything else I use is in conjunction with the Rosetta Stone.  I absolutely do not recommend using this software by itself because it doesn't teach you grammar.  It expects you to automatically be able to figure it out on your own.  If I hadn't already studied German, I would be hopelessly lost and confused.  Here are the rest of my resources:

Wie Geht's was my textbook for German at Truman and it is amazing and I love it.  It is only limited by vocabulary, not grammar.  It covers just about everything, as far as I can tell.  I think I paid $4 for it used because it was a past edition too.  If you're not studying German, I recommend finding a prior edition for a textbook that has good reviews to go along with your language of choice.

This book has been more amazing than I thought it would be.  It comes in several different languages and if you are trying to learn a new language, buy it. It covers everything first in English and then in German, which is huge because you cannot fully understand the grammar of a second language if you don't completely understand the concept in English.  It has made all of the difference in my understanding German grammar (which is a hot mess and can be completely overwhelming).

I purchased all three German SparkCharts (Verbs, Vocabulary, and Grammar) before I went to Austria the first time as a sort of crash course.  I use the Verbs one most, because it lists all of the regular and irregular verb forms and conjugations, plus explains a bit of the grammar.  I also really like the grammar one because it explains word order (to some extent).  The vocabulary one covers a ton of random material, but I don't see the logic in some of the things they picked to include or leave out.  They're $5 each, and worth it I think (at least for the Verbs/Grammar).

And last, but definitely not least, links!

I do have a German-English dictionary but I almost never use it because I have two amazing websites that I use instead:

dict.leo.org

dict.cc

These websites are amazing wonderful fantastic helpful etc., etc.  Leo is the one all of my German-speaking friends use and I'm pretty sure most students of German know it.  It's like a dictionary on steroids and I can't recommend it enough.  The only thing I dislike about it is that if the word you're looking up is declined, Leo won't recognize it.

Fortunately, dict.cc will pull up declined words.  It's not quite as good as Leo in general translation, but it does have a native speaker recording of almost every word and phrase which is incredibly helpful for pronunciation.  Usually if I just need a basic translation I'll go to Leo, but if I want a better idea of pronunciation or can't pull something up on Leo, I switch over to this page.

I also use Google translate occasionally if I have a long sentence I need to translate.  I dislike using the online translators cause they're never 100% accurate, but I've tried most of them and Google's is definitely the best.  Just never put something in English in and expect to get logical German out on the other side.

The last resource I use is for German word order.  Even for all the books that I have and all of the reading that I did, trying to figure out what goes where in German is not easy.  Fortunately, I came across this page and it is everything I was looking for and then some.  It does an absolutely fantastic job of answering pretty much every question you can think of regarding word order.

I hope that this entry helps someone's language-learning process a little!  And if you have any suggestions for me, I'll gladly take them! :)

Tschüss!

New year, new post

Ahhh, first post of 2012!  I hope everyone's New Years celebrations went well and that the year has started out well.  I've heard a lot of people say that 2011 wasn't a great year for them (and I would tend to agree) so hopefully this year is better for everyone!

My year started out relatively boringly, which I'm definitely not complaining about.  Mr. Leick and myself stayed in, watched football, and generally did nothing until midnight, at which point we had our midnight kiss, drank some sparkling juice (because we are old) and then went to bed.  I worked all day on the first but had today off which was nice.

But now onto the actual point of this post!  Since work really kicked into gear for the Christmas season, I completely slacked on my diet.  Not so much on the learning German part, but definitely on the diet.  I didn't really work out (although I was on my feet for at least a full eight and a half hours a day, usually running around like a chicken with my head cut off which counts for something) and I ate out more frequently and introduced more processed food and a lot of less healthy drink options (not soda though!) back into my diet.  The whole time, I said that once the Christmas season ended and I wasn't stressed out with work, I'd go back to it.  I'm incredibly proud of myself for making good on that statement.  I didn't GAIN any of the weight I'd lost back, but I certainly didn't lose anymore and I really, really want to get back down to a weight I haven't seen since high school, which is about 20-30 pounds away.  I put on an absolutely ridiculous amount of weight between college and getting married and I would love for it to all go away, and then some.

Since I knew that I would need the motivation to get back to it, I asked a couple of people for weight loss-related things for Christmas.  My mom got me these awesome resistance bands:

Three different resistances in super fun colors!

Plus Kate, one of my best friends, got me these:

(Cue the Freshman year P.E. flashback)

This video is AMAZING.  I LOVE LOVE LOVE Bob.  SO MUCH.

(More on him in a moment.)

And then today while grocery shopping at Aldi I happened upon one of the best deals I've ever found: a PINK(!) exercise ball for $6.99!  I didn't even think twice about throwing it in my cart.

Blowing up the ball

Looking like a deflated balloon. xD

All blown up!  

(I'm not entirely sure why I took these pictures, but I did so I'm posting them.)

I actually started working out again on New Year's Eve.  I had nothing better to do so I figured I'd work out, and it felt really, really good to be back at it.  If I hadn't started feeling like I was going to puke (from my meal three hours earlier) I'm sure I would have made it through the 30 Day Shred.  Of course, the next day on the first, I felt like my abs were going to eat me alive but I didn't mind.  It felt so good to know that I was being healthy again that I was excited about it.  Then today I did the Biggest Loser cardio workout and I discovered Trainer Bob.  

I've never seen The Biggest Loser, but having done a workout video with Bob and one with Jillian, I would do SO much better on Bob's team.  Matt was even watching my workout and he said he felt motivated to join me after watching the first few minutes and hearing the way Bob approached his audience/the people from the Biggest Loser who were doing the workout.  I'm not going to completely sideline the 30 Day Shred, but I think that I'm going to be doing the cardio workout tape much more frequently now.  I need a video that keeps me motivated and the negative motivation I get from doing Jillian's workout (I WILL FINISH THIS AND BEAT YOU, YOU BITCH) is far more emotionally draining than the positive motivation I got from doing Bob's today.  I didn't feel like I was being mocked for needing to modify certain exercises because I'm just not there physically yet.

In addition to being awesome in the video, Matthew discovered his website.  It has all things weightloss related and I am really excited to get to explore it more.  He has a few videos about healthy food recipes he likes including one for oatmeal with fresh apples, chopped almonds, and cinnamon.  He even lists a few very interesting facts about cinnamon that I never would have known.  I feel a little like I'm gushing about a new crush, but I am really excited about the new video and the website.

PLUS! My workout pants kept almost falling down today, and let's not even talk about every pair of other pants I own, and a few skirts from work.  To know that my clothes are all getting too big is incredibly exciting because it hasn't really happened for me, well...ever.

And because I want to include a touch of my learning German in this post...

I've been making a lot of progress there, too!  I spent a few hours over a couple of days pouring over every material I have that discusses German grammar and I finally feel like I really, really understand how it works.  I understand the seven different verb cases and at least the idea behind each one and my vocabulary is growing (although I really need to make more flashcards) and I feel like I'm making some big strides.  I'm going to work on it a bit more after I finish this post and it's getting kind of late, so I think I'll just end this here.

Hopefully I'll have another update soon and it won't be another two weeks before I get another post out. :)

Tschüss!

Christmas and "The Apple Saga" Finale

Hello everyone!

It's been a little while since I posted anything, but I have a ginormous, picture-filled post for today.  First, Christmas!  It is my favorite holiday and Matthew and I went back to Omaha again this year.  Here are the pictures:

Me with my two best friends, Liz and Kate.  Usually we never get a picture where we all look like we like each other, so this one was nice.  I don't get to see them nearly enough so it was fantastic to see them while I was home. :D

Christmas tree!  There were seven of us there on Christmas morning this year and the tree isn't very big so the presents all kind of spilled out.

My mom has started getting my sisters and I each a Peggy Carr tray for Christmas, and this is the one she went with this year.  I love it!  I'll have to have people over soon so I can use it. 

Handy-dandy multi-purpose tool from my dad.

Me with all of the bows from all the presents in my hair.  I don't know when I started doing this, but it looks pretty funny by the end.

From Erin!  It's got all sorts of slang German in it that I probably wouldn't know otherwise.  I'm excited about it!

My dad got Matt and Jordan (Amber's boyfriend) matching shirts.  Awesome.

The girls and Tony with Dad.

Aside from the Peggy Carr tray and German book, Matt and I mostly got Cutco knives.  They are, far and away, the most amazing knives ever and now that I have them, all I want to do is go crazy in the kitchen cooking everything so I get a chance to use them.

This also relates to my other topic - The Apple!  It has been six weeks (on Christmas Day) and I decided to cut it up to see what it looked like on the inside.  It was super squishy on the outside and pretty much covered with bruises and I was really curious.  So I peeled off all of the skin and then cut it up.  (This had absolutely nothing to do with my spiffy new vegetable peeler and knives.)  Anyway, here are all the pictures:

It's hard to see in the pictures, but there is a giant bruise over the n.

De-skinned

All sorts of gross bruises

When I was peeling the skin, it was bunching up under the peeler.  Normally apple skin doesn't do that at all so I thought it was interesting.

You can sort of see it better here.

I look kind of evil in this picture...

Chopping up the apple!

On the actual inside, it looks perfectly good. (Also, I'm really not sure what's going on in the bottom part of this picture.)

I mostly took this picture to show how awesome my knives are because this one just cut two apple seeds perfectly in half.

The remains of the apple.

So my final conclusion is that the apple was definitely inedible.  You could definitely see all of the bruises under the skin.  What you couldn't see was how squishy it felt - and how there was almost no juice left in it.  I cut out a little bit of one of the pieces to see how it tasted and it was really, really, really sour - even for a granny smith apple, and it was almost completely dry.  I am pretty impressed with how it held up though.  I was kind of expecting it to be like, melting on my counter by now.

In any event, I'm glad the experiment ended the way it did because I would be really freaked out if the apple was still edible at this point.

And one more thing for fun - I made a video as an excuse to play with scissors!

Here are the remains of the penny - I made another swirly thing!  (I found the original part that I cut off about 10 feet away from where I was sitting.)

My attempt at cutting up a two cent Euro coin

And the other side.

Anyway, so that's everything for today.  I promise the next post will be relevant to my goals. :)

Till next time...

Tschüss!

I think I can...I think I can...

I was all excited to be able to sleep in today because it's the one day I close this week and I don't have to go to work until 2:30 (which means working till 11, but I'll deal).  In any event, I was thinking I was going to be able to sleep for a ridiculous amount of time and wake up and laze around, get a workout in and do next to nothing for a few hours before I got ready for work.  Apparently my alarm clock (that I forgot to turn off) had other ideas.  So I woke up at about 6:30 and have been going (except for a brief attempt to fall back asleep at about 10) since.

I'm really glad I actually got up and worked though, because it's been an incredibly productive morning.  I've been feeling incredibly overwhelmed by German grammar since I decided to tackle learning the language.  This morning, I've worked on nothing but grammar.  I've gone through the cases and read every bit of information I have on what applies when.  I went back through material I thought I left in 8th grade - subjects, objects (direct and indirect), prepositions, objects of prepositions...you get the point - and I can finally say I don't feel overwhelmed by learning German (and actually, English makes a bit more sense now too).  I finally feel like I can really actually do this - and it might not be that hard.

Even though it might not seem like there's a system, when you get down to the nitty gritty of it it's all there.  There's a logical pattern to (almost) everything and all I had to do was find it.  Now it's just a LOT of memorization, which I can do without a problem and applying the grammar to the words.

Going back to my last post... After thinking about it, I've determined that the problems that I have with speaking German are twofold: first, it takes me awhile to form sentences because my vocabulary is pretty small and up until now, the grammar was completely overwhelming.  Second, I know my pronunciation is decent but there are a couple issues I have (most of them with the letter ü, and also the word der Apfelstrudel - but that's a whole other story) and I'm really, really self-conscious about them.

I think the solution to the first one is clearly to start writing in German - a lot.  It allows me to take the time I need to think of the words to say and where to put them in the sentence without feeling pressured to spit something out immediately.  I'm going to try to journal with the German I do know and I'll think about some other ways I can use written German more.  Once I feel more comfortable with my ability to compose sentences, I can start speaking German with native speakers and eventually that should help get my pronunciation closer to where I'd like it to be.

Additionally, I can absorb as much spoken German as possible.  I can watch videos or movies in German, find German vlogs or podcasts or anything - just listen to native German speakers in any medium that I can get my hands on.  One of my friends told me the reason his English is so good is because he listens to English whenever he can with movies, TV shows, etc.  Plus, the old AM at my store said that she learned English by watching it on TV when she moved here.  It clearly works, so I feel like it'd be wise to take advantage of those mediums.

So we'll see how it goes from here on out.  I'm glad I had a breakthrough, because I really needed one.  I was feeling stuck in a rut so hopefully it'll be smooth(er) sailing from here.

I hope everyone has a nice few days and gets all of the last minute stuff done for Christmas! :)

Tschüss!

Thoughts on learning German and speaking English

I was using Rosetta Stone tonight when the word fahren (to drive) came up in several sentences.  It reminded me that sometimes having native German speakers speak English can be as helpful with learning the language as having them speak German. 

I already know and understand the way fahren is used not because I've studied it before, but because of how one of my Austrian friends used the word in English.  We were having a conversation and he said he would drive back home which confused me for a multitude of reasons (he didn't have a car, for one).  It turned out that he really meant he would take the train.  Where we would say "I rode the bus" or "I took a train/taxi/subway", German uses fahren ("Ich fahre mit dem Bus" or "Ich fahre mit dem Zug").  This is also how I learned "ein Foto machen" (literally, to make a picture) and a few others. 

This also gives me the chance to touch on something else...

When I was in Austria last time, I mostly refused to speak German because I knew very little and using the language with native speakers intimidates the crap out of me.  I have absolutely no problem rambling in German at work where no one understands me; in fact, I think it's all sorts of fun.  But I get nervous about butchering the language when I'm talking to someone who should actually understand what I'm saying.  I know it's completely counter-intuitive because I'm never going to get better if I don't make mistakes and learn from them.

I need to get over my incessant need to be perfect or I'm never going to become fluent.  I'll spend the rest of this year being too afraid to actually speak the language I'm trying to learn and I won't accomplish my goal.  If I wait until I understand everything to actually attempt speaking German to native speakers, I won't ever get anywhere.  I'm not entirely sure how I'm going to manage fixing this, but I know I need to figure something out.

In any event, I'm not going to solve that problem tonight so I'm going to go to bed and sleep on it.

Tschüss!

EDIT

I forgot to talk add this last night and I didn't feel like making a whole new post, so I'm talking about it here...

I wanted to give an apple update. It's been about 5 weeks now and the apple is decidedly unedible. It looks fine for the most part, but it has a couple of big bruises and it's kind of squishy all the way around. I think I'm going to leave it out until week 6 and then I'm going to cut it open and see what it looks like on the inside, mostly out of morbid curiosity.

Anyway, that's all I had. Till next time...